The Grenada sentinel., 1887-02-26
THE tNSTALMENT PLAN.

from the tricks of swindlers, profes'
sional or otherwisep" asked reporter
of member of leading firm Of fur
niture dealers in this city lately.
..No. we do not, to any but very
small extent" was the reply. At one
time we did experience frequent and
rather heavy losses, but we have SO
perfected our system now that we are
practically safe."
"How is that?"
well, do you see that box there?"
pointing to an office at the end OF the
store. "The men there are specially
employed as detectives, to make inqui-
ries about would-be purchasers, who
want furniture on the installment sys-
tenn and look after our interests where
goods have been thus obtained, and !
venture to say that they equal in
ability Pinkerton's detectives or any
others you could name. The thing is
done in this way. A man comes in and
wants 1900 or $500 worth of furniture,
paying small sum down and the rest
monthly. We inquire of him what is
his position, what are his prospects,
his family embarrassments, and SC
forth. If his replies are satisfactory
we take his deposit. But before the
furniture is put in one of our detec-
tives goes around and takes care to
verify all the strangers statements.
He does this in quiet, practical way,
never using the firms name, of course,
and going about it in such manner
that the customer. if every thing is all
right, will never hear that any inqui-
ries have been made. But if the story
told us proves in any way incorrect,
we apprise the customer of what we
have learned, and ask him to explain
the facts. In nine cases out of ten
no explanation is offered; he calls, or
more usually sends, for his deposit,
and there is an end of it.
"We keep detailed account of all
the people who have dealt with us,
with notes as to their financial condi-
ton, and when they have once found
them trustworthy we are always ready
to deal with them again. This answers
very well in general, but we had mar
row escape quite recently. A man
named jackson asked for a heavy
consignment, and referred us
to our books, where we
found that he had dealt with us some
time ago, and was marked AL. We
were upon the point of letting him
have the goods without further ques.
ton, but the character and quantity Of
the order did not seem quite to tally
with his profession Inquiries were
made at the address he had given, and
the interesting fact was speedily
developed that, although the name and
initials were the same, he was totally
different man from the one we had
previously dealt with. 1t was, in fact,
very clever case of personation. In
answer to our written query of why
is this?' he sent woman to get his
deposit, and we heard no more of him.
"a man came here only week OF
two ago; seemed like a gentleman,
and talked very plausibly. He wanted
us to furnish house for him, and he
would give us his note for the cash,
When we declined he offered to get the
note indorsed by well known city
man who is good for 100000. To that
we replied that he could borrow the
money from his hacker at 10 per cent.
as we would allow h i'm so much off the
price for cash. But he didn't feel equa
to that, and went. o, yes, we get lot.
of folk in here every day, almost, who
think they can trick us, and who mis-
represent themselves, but they nevel
do much good. What class trouble III
most in this wayp Well, the people
who want to seem much bigger thar
they are, and, of all other folks, I mus
say the lawyers are most given to it. )
mo, we have no detective bureau,
said member Of another large firm
, "We should need small army if w
once began that. We are not oftel
bitten, either, and don't care to tall
about our losses when we are We ha'
one big loss some time back, when W
, put several thousand dollars worth o
stuff into a house on the West Side. !
= was all shipped off to st. Louis tn
, night before the first payment fell due
t and sold, some of it there and some il
0 Cincinnati and Chicago We afterwar
found out that the same folks ha
played a similar game elsewhere, bu
we never caught them. We can gen
f! orally size man up before we hav
o talked to him ten minutes, and as W
u never let any furniture pass out of ou
. hands unpaid for unless we are quit
e satisfied, you can see that we are pref
ty safe. IN. Y. Commercial Adve,
s hSer.
- English VS.. American Girls.